If you're familiar with it at all, you know that Facebook, an
Internet entity that calls itself a "social networking service" is
notorious for censoring the opinions of users it disagrees with
politically.

Not only do users whom Facebook dislikes (mostly those who call
themselves conservatives) find themselves "suspended" and the posts
they've made officially removed, but in a more devious and sinister
operating procedure, many individuals (mostly libertarians) see their
writings disappear almost the moment they click on "Post", as if some
evil manifestation of artificial intelligence were lurking in the
system, waiting for some combination of keywords to occur before it
strikes.

On the other hand (the left one), individuals who suggest, for
example, that George Zimmerman should be killed, or that George W.
Bush should have been allowed to die on the operating table, remain
uninterfered with. Only those who complain about such posts are
punished.

After half a dozen years of this kind of thing, and thousands, if
not millions, of futile complaints, some Facebook users have decided
to take the only ethical and legal action open to them, beginning with
a nationwide—or worldwide—24-hour "blackout" or boycott of the
service.

From 12:00 AM, August 25, 2013 (the midnight between Saturday and
Sunday), until the same time Monday morning—for the sake of free
speech and individual liberty—users are being asked, not merely to
refrain from using Facebook, but to suspend their accounts for 24
hours. Links and detailed instructions may be found at the end of this
article.

John Vigil, Ted Welsh and the twelve other heroic individuals who
began this move have their work cut out for them. Facebook started as
a humble campus messaging system at Harvard in 2004. It is now a
fifteen billion dollar ($15,000,000,000) corporation, with over 6,000
employees, and more than a billion users across the surface of the
planet.

In addition, there are certain ethical questions about boycotting
Facebook which it would never occur to "liberals" or "progressives" to
ask (their vile and pernicious practice of "political correctness" has
been used as a fascistic steamroller to crush First Amendment rights
all over this country—especially on college campuses), but may be
troubling to libertarians and a small handful of uncommonly decent
conservatives.

One question I've heard people ask is, "How can users complain
about the service when it's free?" I'm not entirely certain how that's
relevant, unless the questioner is attempting to invoke something akin
to gratitude, but an equally irrelevant answer is that, according to
their kindred spirit and fellow traveler Wikipedia, the Facebook
corporation takes in about five billion dollars ($5,000,000,000) a
year, and that users, in essence, are either the laborers, or a crop
being harvested. Gratitude doesn't enter into the ethical equation at
all.

Another argument is that Facebook is private property and its
owners have every right to operate it as they wish. But there are two
things wrong with that position. The first is that Facebook is not
private property, it is a corporation. It is a group of individuals
who have petitioned the government for special treatment, special
powers and immunities that the ordinary individual doesn't have, among
them, the ability, when the going gets tough, to fob off their moral
and financial obligations onto an imaginary playmate, leaving them
untouched.

Facebook, exactly like every other corporation doing business in
America, has made itself an organ or appendage of the government, and,
as such, must be subject to the same Bill of Rights restrictions as
the rest of government, including absolute respect for freedom of
expression.

One aspect of that freedom is the right not to do business with
an individual or entity for any reason that suits you, to communicate
your intention to others, and to ask them to join you. Facebook, on
the other hand, has no right to your participation or patronage, and,
in a free market system, must strive to earn it, every day, every
hour, every minute. It seems odd to have to lecture the "genuiuses"
who created Facebook, but censorship is not a very good way to win
customers.

And by the way, speaking of property rights (which I, myself,
otherwise believe to be sacrosanct and absolute), you're not allowed
to kill people on your property, or to restrain them and keep them as
slaves. What does that tell us about their right to say whatever they
wish?

Let the flame-wars begin!

Finally—an argument that might appeal to those rare "liberals"
and "progressives" capable of rudimentary logic—there is the 1964
Public Accommodations Act which holds that if you operate a lunch
counter or a bus company, for example, that is generally open to the
public, you can't refuse to serve a member of that public because you
don't like the color of their skin, or make them sit in the back of
the bus.

As a libertarian, I didn't like this law when it passed, and I
still don't. It obliterates freedom of association, and basically
nationalizes every business in the country. I also think that if a
businessman is stupid enough to reject a significant fraction of his
potential clientele (about 40 percent of the population where I went
to high school in northern Florida in 1964—and maybe 70 percent in
Mississippi during the same period) he has an absolute right to go
belly-up.

But the Public Accommodations Act was imposed on this country by
"liberal" Democrats—which is what, I would guess, the founders of
Facebook are, as well—and they should be forced to comply with it,
even (or especially) when it doesn't suit their purposes, until it is
repealed.

I believe Facebook and entities like it have been a very important
element in the revolution that has begun to sound the death knell for
the 6000-year-old Age of Authority, by turning human communications
sideways.

If Barack Obama had a FaceBook page he paid personal attention to,
he'd be hiding in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan because, after five
years on the job (figuratively speaking), he's bungled it so badly,
exposing himself as the liar, coward, and mass murderer he is, that,
thanks to the Internet, the only people left who don't despise him are
drooling retards and would-be guards and doctors for his concentration
camps.

Sooner or later, thanks to the 'Net, we will have a free country.

A final word: it is inevitable that someone will point out that I
have published an online opinion journal for coming-on 18 years, now.
It advertises itself as a libertarian online journal. Doesn't that
mean that I will exclude the opinions of Democrats, "progressives",
"liberals", socialists, communists, and other varieties of political
parasites?

Not exactly.

During the nearly two decades that The Libertarian Enterprise
has existed, it has had seven different editors, seven very distinct
personalities, and I have always done my best to give each of them a
free hand. It's irrational to ask somebody to do a job, and then hover
over their shoulder, doing it for them. I think the results speak for
themselves.

But as to censoring or snubbing collectivists? On the contrary, we
welcome leftists of all kinds to submit their notions to TLE,
principally, I confess, so that our readers can point at them and
laugh.

Here are details I promised on the blackout, in the words of the
organizers:

[Description] We are organizing a nationwide "blackout" of Facebook to
protest their arbitrary and capricious policies targeting
conservatives with censoring and suspensions.

We are asking for all conservatives to suspend (deactivate) their
accounts for at least 24 hours on August 25th which is Facebook's
anniversary. If you are a business or promoting a page and have a FB
advertising account, we are asking that you also suspend that for 24
hours.

Eastern Time: 8/25/13 at 2 a.m.

Central Time: 8/25/13 at 1 a.m.

Mountain Time: 8/25/13 at 12 a.m.

Pacific Time: 8/24/13 at 11 p.m.

TO DEACTIVATE YOUR ACCOUNT:

1. Go to account settings.

2. Click on security.

3. Choose to deactivate your account and follow the instructions.

4. When given the option to choose, select "This is temporary. I will
be back." Then continue following the instructions.

5. When you reactivate, it is just a matter of logging in as usual.

WARNING TO PAGE ADMINS. If you administer a page for a business, or
group or any other organization, YOU MUST MAKE SOMEONE in addition to
yourself AN ADMIN TOO. If you deactivate your profile and you are the
SOLE ADMIN of a page, you run the risk of losing that page, its
content and your LIKEs. So make a friend or relative an admin of your
page OR consider unpublishing the page for 24 hours so it will not be
deleted when you deactivate on Sunday, August 25.

YOU WILL ALSO BE WARNED ABOUT THIS WHEN YOU GO TO DEACTIVATE YOUR
PROFILE/TIMELINE.

Neil again: I'm personally asking all libertarians, everywhere, to
participate in this blackout, as well. I have often had occasion to
remark that, as group, we are more talented at thinking up perfectly
"sound" reasons to sit on our asses and refrain from doing what needs
to be done than any other people, and I am certain that there are
bucketheads among us who will not disappoint me in that regard. But in
the long run, it's probably even more important to us than it is to
conservatives.